Date Night
by Is-there-somewhere-x
Summary: Zoe organises a surprise for Max on their first night in the new flat - but will everything go to plan? A little idea I had ages ago but have only just got round to uploading.


**I admit this is a bit of a random idea but I thought it would be cute to go along with Zoe and Max moving in together (how adorable were the scenes last night ajshsjah) Anyway... This should only be two parts unless I feel the need to continue it! Hope it doesn't make anyone too hungry ;P**

Zoe had never been looking forward to a day off this much for a very long time. Acting clinical lead in the absence of Connie was taking its toll on her. She had forgotten how stressful her old position was - with Guy Self, or Hanssen, well, whoever was in charge these days, constantly breathing down her neck, piles of paperwork that never seemed to go away, not to mention having to deal with conflicts between her staff.

But it wasn't all bad, as Max had noticed how exhausted she was and started cooking her special dinners every night, providing her with a constant stream of alcohol and her beloved cigarettes, so she decided it was time to repay him.

All Zoe wanted was to stay in bed but she had a busy day ahead of her. Max was going into the city centre to do some early morning shopping, leaving Zoe just enough time to complete her mission.

She rolled over to face her alarm. 07:00. She had to check that Max wasn't still tucked up beside her, knowing he wasn't much of a morning person. Zoe was pleasantly surprised to find the bed empty.

Suddenly, her phone vibrated, a message popping up on the screen which read: 'Massive traffic jam going into city, might be bit longer shopping then! - Max x'

This wasn't exactly bad news - there would be more time to get everything done!

Zoe got dressed into some old clothes before making her way into the kitchen of the couples' new flat. They were still in the process of moving in, and there were boxes all over the place, but the kitchen was more or less clear.

The first part of the surprise was Max's favourite pizza. Zoe rushed to get the necessary ingredients out of the cupboards and began reading the recipe. It looked quite complicated, but it was nothing she couldn't handle, hopefully...

Only 10 minutes later and already the kitchen was a huge mess after a failed attempt at using a food processor. They had only purchased it recently, so it had never been used before. Well, it hadn't even come out of the box yet. Assembling it was a challenge itself - the instructions were practically in another language, resulting in flour and yeast being thrown all over the kitchen when it was turned on.

This was only the start of Zoe's problems, which included pouring a whole cup of water into the mixture, before re-reading the instructions and finding that you were meant to do it bit-by-bit. She sighed. This early in the morning things were bound to go wrong.

She proceeded to roll the dough out on to the counter which she had caked in flour, but despite her best efforts, the dough was clinging on to the rolling pin for dear life.

Somehow she recovered it, and managed to create quite a professional looking pizza base. Zoe threw the toppings on carelessly - at this point she just wanted it to go safely in the oven, where the only bad thing that could happen to it was a slightly crispy, maybe burnt edge.

Once it had gone in, Zoe glanced at her surroundings. The flour and yeast incident earlier was absolutely nothing compared to the state of the kitchen now, but there wasn't much point in cleaning it all up now with a lot more still to do, so she would just have to work around the mess.

She had found a recipe for a chocolate cake which she knew Max would love. Fortunately Zoe found this a lot easier to make - this time with minimal damage inflicted on the kitchen.

She glanced at the clock on the kitchen wall. Max would be returning soon and there was still one task left to complete. After all, it wouldn't be a proper dinner if the table wasn't appropriately decorated.

Zoe had gone out on her break yesterday and bought some vanilla scented candles, a new tablecloth and some shiny new cutlery. Once the candles were lit, the table was ready and the kitchen was back to its usual clean state, the flat looked (and smelled) gorgeous. She hoped Max would love it after all the effort she had put in.

 **I'll upload part 2 as soon as it's ready, I admit I'm not sure when that may be because I am very bad at getting things done!**


End file.
